*Official* Third Test at Edgbaston

[grecian]

So does this mean England are now officially no 1 regardless of what happens in the last test?

yep, a 2 test win is what we needed

 

[Zinzan]

yep, a 2 test win is what we needed

Cool, at last a no 1 test team that actually feels like one. Have to say India always felt like caretakers of the no 1 position for mine, whereas I highly doubt ANYONE would question England currently being the best test side

 

[GIMH]

I like you zinzan

 

[irfan]

Haven't had time to frequent the forum as much as I would like but I would just like to congratulate England for thoroughly annihilating and destroying us. It was always gonna be uphill for us after Zak broke down on the first day but England frickin flew with that bit of misfortune and rammed home the advantage.

Although we've had injuries with the batting lineup, not reaching 300 once in six innings is a pitiful effort. Hope we actually compete in the final test - take it to the last day that's all I am asking for

Highlights might be painful to watch but I might bring myself around

 

[Son Of Coco]

Congratulations England fans, England far too strong in this series. Have developed quite the bowling unit, and I can't see any other team around at the moment that will challenge them on that front. Other teams have reasonable batting line-ups, but when your bowling is all over the shop you're in a bit of trouble.

 

[smash84]

Cool, at last a no 1 test team that actually feels like one. Have to say India always felt like caretakers of the no 1 position for mine, whereas I highly doubt ANYONE would question England currently being the best test side

awta. It also seemed that India were caretaker number 1. Having said that I must say that Dhoni did a wonderful job with a side with such a terrible bowling attack. He has done the best with his meager resources and I guess India could have lasted only so long as the number 1 side with a terrible bowling unit. There was always a feeling that their bowling unit would be found out. Too bad it got found out in a crunch series.

 

[honestbharani]

Congratulations to England and all England supporters!!! It is such a great feeling when your side becomes #1... Hopefully, they will make a much better fist of it than we did. This has been just reward for all the meticulous planning by England.. It was always kinda odd to see a coaching staff as big as the team itself but hey, they let the results speak for them..



Love Andy Flower and Strauss though. Come across as top blokes and they thoroughly deserve this run.


It is crunch time for India though.. There are two ways we can go from here.


1. Try and work at our deficiencies and come back a better side with better planning and preparation.

2. To hell with tests and juz start organizing and concentrating on the Limited Overs stuff.


I hope to God we go with the first option but knowing the BCCI, it will most likely by the second.

 

[ankitj]

SA stronger than India that's for sure.

That 1-1 tie, well it just happens sometimes. Not even Australia won all the time.

Funny you say that. In the decider, it was India that had a real chance of winning and SA had to play for the draw. But whatever you want to believe...

 

[Bun]

Cool, at last a no 1 test team that actually feels like one. Have to say India always felt like caretakers of the no 1 position for mine, whereas I highly doubt ANYONE would question England currently being the best test side

would disagree entirely on Indians being considered caretakers (lol wtf that means!)

Agree on the English being worthy of no.1 spot. They have earned it, but no means they're anywhere near the benchmarks we have (Windies of 80s and Aus of 95-07), unless they manage to replicate this elsewhere, especially overseas (in the subc). I am not fully convinced about their spinner yet. He's got carted around in a series where our batsmen have otherwise looked total bunnies.

That said, to be no.1 doesn't need you to be invincible everywhere on the planet. England are no.1 at the moment, but I am not so sure we can call them dominant. One just needs to rewind a series back and see Eng beat SL 1-0 in a 3 test series. So as England has been awesome, India has been dire as well.

Coming months will prove whether I am wrong or right. But I think the general pattern would be after a brief honeymoon England will face tougher challenges particularly in the winter.

 

[ankitj]

All this takes us back to whether being #1 means you have to annihilate all other teams everywhere. You could be #1 by a small margin too. As for India, they did get very good results until this series. They went for 3 years without dropping a series and deserved to be #1, no matter by how little.

However, it was quite obvious that India had a shallow talent pool and their #1 ranking was always under threat (and the distractions like IPL don't help either). We Indian fans had become too optimistic because with same thin resources, we were getting good results for us.

 

[robelinda]

Well it won't be a surprise if India make 500 in the 4th test and Dravid or Sachin make big tons. But you have to think, is this 2011 or 1997?

 

[Uppercut]

Funny you say that. In the decider, it was India that had a real chance of winning and SA had to play for the draw. But whatever you want to believe...

That just... didn't happen?

 

[Daemon]

That just... didn't happen?

Yeah, the only time we had them was when they were 200 odd for 7. Then Boucher and the tail had a long stand and set us a target of 350. Either result was possible and there just wasn't enough time unfortunately. It was hardly SA playing for the draw. If anything, we batted really slowly on day 5 to play for the draw.

 

[Uppercut]

Haha that's a bit revisionist too. Kallis batted India out of the game.

I suppose you could argue that India were closer to winning the game than South Africa ever were, but that's neither here nor there.

 

[Daemon]

Haha that's a bit revisionist too. Kallis batted India out of the game.

I suppose you could argue that India were closer to winning the game than South Africa ever were, but that's neither here nor there.

Ahh, his twin hundreds, how could I forget.

 

[ankitj]

Haha that's a bit revisionist too. Kallis batted India out of the game.

I suppose you could argue that India were closer to winning the game than South Africa ever were, but that's neither here nor there.

My bad. You are right. SA didn't have to play for draw but India had a very realistic chance of finishing with a 2-1 result.

 

[centurymaker]

dhoni gifted the draw to SA by allowing kallis to take free singles while he was injured.
**** captain. will never be forgiven.

 

[flibbertyjibber]

Been away for a couple of booze filled days but managed to watch the cricket. Awesome performance by England, India showed little fight again which is a shame as it hasn't really been a contest in this series when we all expected one.

Tendulkar was so unlucky, freak dismissal when the master looked settled for the first time in the series. The ton will come, probably in the one day series. Dhoni and PK had fun again but it was just like Broad and Swann v Aussies at Headingley, too little far too late.

So we are now Number 1 and nobody can dispute that, on we go to the last test which could easily be another thrashing for India as they look totally demoralised.

 

[R_D]

Congrats to England fans......

 

[nick-o]

In breaking news, the ICC has just announced that, following a "strong request" from the BCCI, it has decided the third test should have been cancelled due to the riots, so the result is void and India are still number one test team.